Film Enter the Void

[Janja]

Preordered the DVD on Amazon and it arrived today.

Watched it tonight! Beautiful! Beautiful! Beautiful! Though I was sold at Irreversible. =P

 

[hydroazuanacaine]

3 1/2 stars. I liked it, but at over 2 1/2 hours it is a little long, and it is not so great that it doesn't feel that long. I'd like to watch it again, but damn.

I wonder if the writer's sister and mom are just banging, and he's had to deal with that his whole life.

You could make and excuse to show it in an intro to film class because the entire movie is shot in the first person perspective of a single character.

As to watching this movie on acid or shrooms, I don't know about that. I'm all for watching something like Saw on shrooms with a bunch of friends--or at least there was a time in my life i was--but you don't wanna see this shit on acid. plus, movies that look trippy when you are sober are rarely better when actually tripping.

 

[ektamine]

Just downloaded and watched the high-res version off of torrentz...

Don't really know what to say. I'm not absolutely blown away or anything, but the film definitely took my somewhere unusual. FANTASTIC visual effects, were probably the best part.

You have to see it to understand it. It will be a little long for some, but with a few puffs of something or another you should be just right.

 

[Rasclatt]

terrible acting, got very boring at points and there was no real content or plot to be seen. I still really enjoyed it though. Visually you wont see anything like it, infact technically over all it was amazing, the sound effects used in it were fantastic aswell. And the "shock" scenes blew most film makers attempts completley out the water. I dont even want to think about what would happen if Gasper Noe decided to make a horror flick. I dont knw if you can call it a film even really, its more like a visual rollercoaster ride (analogy can be seen directly in the film, I think thats all he was going for really), with paddles jutting out that slap you in the face occasionally.

 

[psood0nym]

I saw this a while ago at a theater on a low dose of 25C-NBOMe. The psychedelic didn't add much of anything to the film. Even though psychedelics and visions play a much larger role in the film than most "psychedelic films," for me it was too nihilistic and ponderous and taxing to enjoy watching it on them. I certainly appreciated parts of it, some quite a bit, but the seemingly redundant repetitions of the same thing got annoying (how many people does he have to watch fucking as a disembodied spirit?), and those annoyances, amplified by tripping, ironically made it harder to see anything more to appreciate about the story. Had those redundancies not been there it might have turned the experience around.

 

[RedRum OG]

got that shit on torrent. only smoked weed before watching it and it still blew my goddamn mind. i cannot imagine this movie on psychs. the beauty and the art and the patterns.... as well as the weird camera perspectives. great movie

 

[CerebralFlux]

very good movie, except the diletantic representation of smoking dmt.
--> so 4/5

 

[Rasclatt]

^check the vbs interview with Noe, hes smoked alot of DMT. infact from what it looked like he spent quater of his budget on getting out of his mind and shagging hookers.

 

[captainballs]

Very very good. I thought the closed eye visuals were similar to the effect of a lot of different things, how they all have a center, for instance, and a network of veins that are pulsating, getting hot, cold, and more complex - but always centered around a main transistor. The story is great. Definitely not your average exploitative journey through a "drug dealer's" life. The sex with the older woman with recurring thoughts of his dead mother also tripped me out with no drugs involved. I give it four out of five. One of the most effective psychological trips I've ever taken with no drugs. Maybe the best, I don't know.

 

[L2R]

I saw this a while ago at a theater on a low dose of 25C-NBOMe. The psychedelic didn't add much of anything to the film. Even though psychedelics and visions play a much larger role in the film than most "psychedelic films," for me it was too nihilistic and ponderous and taxing to enjoy watching it on them. I certainly appreciated parts of it, some quite a bit, but the seemingly redundant repetitions of the same thing got annoying (how many people does he have to watch fucking as a disembodied spirit?), and those annoyances, amplified by tripping, ironically made it harder to see anything more to appreciate about the story. Had those redundancies not been there it might have turned the experience around.

i felt the same way, although i was completely sobre. it just keeps going on and on. 3/5 for eye candy. loved the first person mirror effects.

 

[hydroazuanacaine]

I just re-read T.S. Eliot's poem, "The Waste Land," for a class. It must have been a huge influence for this film.

"A heap of broken images." That's part of a line from the poem. Would be a pretty approriate description of Enter the Void, huh? In both describing the structuture and tone of the movie. Well, it is also quite self-descriptive of the poem. While the scenes in "The Waste Land" are not connected by a coherent plot and single character like in Enter the Void, it is that same idea of the eye of the narrative moving from one scene to another, giving little glimpses of the human condition. And the nature of those scenes, both in the poem and the movie, certianly brings the adjective "broken" to mind.

But the similarities do not end at stucture. The overlap of themes is very noticeable. Both are heavily centered around the idea of death and re-birth. The concept of abortion is briefly addressed in each. Both have similair scenes depiciting male-female relations, with pretty clear feminist themes. Attempts at human connection--specifically in the modern, urban world. The awakening of the soul--specifically in the modern, urban world.

For anyone partcularly interested in this film and/or its themes, I highly recommend checking this poem out. And anyone who has, do you see it?

 

[ektamine]

^ Googling now

 

[construct]

I just re-read T.S. Eliot's poem, "The Waste Land," for a class. It must have been a huge influence for this film.

"A heap of broken images." That's part of a line from the poem. Would be a pretty approriate description of Enter the Void, huh? In both describing the structuture and tone of the movie. Well, it is also quite self-descriptive of the poem. While the scenes in "The Waste Land" are not connected by a coherent plot and single character like in Enter the Void, it is that same idea of the eye of the narrative moving from one scene to another, giving little glimpses of the human condition. And the nature of those scenes, both in the poem and the movie, certianly brings the adjective "broken" to mind.

But the similarities do not end at stucture. The overlap of themes is very noticeable. Both are heavily centered around the idea of death and re-birth. The concept of abortion is briefly addressed in each. Both have similair scenes depiciting male-female relations, with pretty clear feminist themes. Attempts at human connection--specifically in the modern, urban world. The awakening of the soul--specifically in the modern, urban world.

For anyone partcularly interested in this film and/or its themes, I highly recommend checking this poem out. And anyone who has, do you see it?

Interesting. Going to check out the entirety of "The Waste Land." I am familiar with is the section referencing the Buddha's "Fire Sermon." Just based on that I could see some similarities, considering The Tibetan Book of the Dead is important to the structure of the film. Anyway, spirituality in the modern world...interesting, I'll be looking into it. Seems applicable to the film.

Anyway, film itself: obviously visually stunning. Very pleasurable to watch. Repetition made it hard to sit through at times. Overall, I thought the general theme of reincarnation/life after death was covered well for the ambitious project it was. Weird oedipal stuff raised a lot of questions for me. That stuff is a motif for me on psychedelics and makes me question the significance of familial relations.

 

[qwin]

After having 3 false starts with this movie - starting and stopping it after 20 minutes; my mind was ready for it over the weekend. Whata-Ride this movie is. Intense, visually stunning and the ending is awesome.

Suggested but in HD (where available)

 

[Max Power]

Still can't bring myself to finish this movie (haven't even gotten past the part where he dies (which is early on so, no, not a spoiler ))

 

[Lovegrud]

I heard rumours about this film so without ever watching it before i purchased the bluray. i took 5 tabs removed all distractions and light waited for peak of trip turned up the volume on the surround sound and turned it on.

Was Fricken Insane! Mind =torn apart. So graphic, so amazing and i definately dont reccomend this film for tripping if inexperienced with "difficult" trips. 5 stars for sure

 

[RECA]

I thought this movie had a cool concept but it really threw me off with the whole "blinking thing"

 

[comatoserct]

the part between the first 30 minutes up to the hour and a half can be daunting, but the rest comes back with a strong finish. took me 2 complete watches to fully appreciate.

with irreversible, the camera angles were almost unbearable, as he did them to make the viewer literally nauseous, but the ones in enter the void were insane.

the camera angles must have been programmed into a 3D-CAD like device and installed in a very extensive robotic arm (attached to the camera)

I also love the scenes with him looking at himself in the mirror. Where the fuck is the camera? I know this has been done before in other movies, but this one is particularly outstanding.

also the scenes where the camera goes through buildings is something only a director could truly appreciate. to think of how the film was actually filmed is a mindfuck in itself

 

[Jabberwocky]

Okay, yea, Enter the Void did strike me as a sucky movie. Found this review pretty funny: http://www.erowid.org/library/review/review.php?p=348

If the folks from The Partnership at Drugfree.org need any fuel to feed the ideals of their non-profit organization's media-driven attempt at persuading America's youth to eschew drugs, they could sponsor showings of Enter the Void. Children might learn that creative inspiration produced via the confluence of psychedelics and Eastern spiritual philosophies leads to self-indulgent, tiresome filmmaking. THIS is what results from smoking DMT, kids!

Anyone have any thoughts?

 

[captainballs]

It was alright - well, I didn't really like it or get affected by it, but that's probably because I didn't just start using drugs and looking around yesterday (and I'm not 16). It was a good movie, though - good production values, good story, decent acting, not overly stylized (surprising) - just no emotional effect on me.